Atopic dermatitis, or commonly known as eczema, is a skin disorder that causes red rashes and itching sensation on the skin. More severe cases can even have a flaky appearance and discoloration into white patches or grey areas on the skin.
This condition is autoimmune in nature, meaning that the person’s own immune system attacks the body’s cells and causes irritation. It’s a chronic illness with no cure in sight. However, there are some treatments that relieve the symptoms temporarily until it flares up again.
The condition can arise during the early years of childhood, like 5 or 6 years old, and continue to a lifetime. The body can start acting after adolescence or even after adulthood on some trigger.
Symptoms:
The symptoms of the disease are not rare or life-threatening, but they do make the affected person extraordinarily uncomfortable and irritable.
These symptoms include:
- Dry and itchy patch of skin. The itch can be moderate to severe particularly at night time.
- Red to gray patches on the skin of hands, feet, wrists, eyelids, ankles, and inside of the knees and elbows.
- Cracked or thickened crusty skin
- Raw and sensitive area with slight swelling
Treatments:
Over the years, various medications have been tried and tested. They have successfully provided relief from the symptoms temporarily, but none have been able to cure the condition.
Calcineurin Inhibitors
These are mainly prescription drugs and can cause an initial reaction when used. Some people may experience skin irritation and a burning sensation when they first start using these drugs. However, the symptoms of eczema would arguably subside.
These drugs are most commonly used as topical ointments like Eucrisa, Elidel, and Protopic. These creams get a little used to before the patient feels relief. The side effects that one might face should subside after using the cream a few times.
Oral Prescriptions
Sometimes the symptoms don’t subside by merely treating with topical solutions. For such cases, oral medications are prescribed. Oral medications work best for the people who complain of eczema flaring up in various parts of the body at once. Such patients would instead take a pill than apply a cream over many places that itch.
Otrexup, Omnipred, Myfortic, and Azasan are some of these orally taken drugs. These oral medications should only be taken under the doctors’ strict instructions, and their intake should not exceed it. They may be harmful to the body if not handled carefully.
Injectables
Getting injections for relieving the symptoms of eczema is another way to go. Injections are usually given to patients with severe symptoms that are not relieved with ointments, oral medications, or a combination of both.
In various drug trials, it was discovered that the patients with severe levels of eczema do see an improvement and clearing up of the symptoms after using these injections for almost 4 months.
The treatments commonly used as injectables for eczema are Dupixent with Eurisa. They have proven to be more useful for the severe cases of the disease.
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